How to handle screen orientation change when progress dialog and background thread active?

Question

My program does some network activity in a background thread. Before starting, it pops up a progress dialog. The dialog is dismissed on the handler. This all works fine, exc

Answer 1

Tried to implement jfelectron's solution because it is a "rock-solid solution to these issues that conforms with the 'Android Way' of things" but it took some time to look up and put together all the elements mentioned. Ended up with this slightly different, and I think more elegant, solution posted here in it's entirety.

Uses an IntentService fired from an activity to perform the long running task on a separate thread. The service fires back sticky Broadcast Intents to the activity which update the dialog. The Activity uses showDialog(), onCreateDialog() and onPrepareDialog() to eliminate the need to have persistent data passed in the application object or the savedInstanceState bundle. This should work no matter how your application is interrupted.

Activity Class:

public class TesterActivity extends Activity {
private ProgressDialog mProgressDialog;
private static final int PROGRESS_DIALOG = 0;

@Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    setContentView(R.layout.main);

    Button b = (Button) this.findViewById(R.id.test_button);
    b.setOnClickListener(new OnClickListener() {
        public void onClick(View v) {
            buttonClick();
        }
    });
}

private void buttonClick(){
    clearPriorBroadcast();
    showDialog(PROGRESS_DIALOG);
    Intent svc = new Intent(this, MyService.class);
    startService(svc);
}

protected Dialog onCreateDialog(int id) {
    switch(id) {
    case PROGRESS_DIALOG:
        mProgressDialog = new ProgressDialog(TesterActivity.this);
        mProgressDialog.setProgressStyle(ProgressDialog.STYLE_HORIZONTAL);
        mProgressDialog.setMax(MyService.MAX_COUNTER);
        mProgressDialog.setMessage("Processing...");
        return mProgressDialog;
    default:
        return null;
    }
}

@Override
protected void onPrepareDialog(int id, Dialog dialog) {
    switch(id) {
    case PROGRESS_DIALOG:
        // setup a broadcast receiver to receive update events from the long running process
        IntentFilter filter = new IntentFilter();
        filter.addAction(MyService.BG_PROCESS_INTENT);
        registerReceiver(new MyBroadcastReceiver(), filter);
        break;
    }
}

public class MyBroadcastReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver{
    @Override
    public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
        if (intent.hasExtra(MyService.KEY_COUNTER)){
            int count = intent.getIntExtra(MyService.KEY_COUNTER, 0);
            mProgressDialog.setProgress(count);
            if (count >= MyService.MAX_COUNTER){
                dismissDialog(PROGRESS_DIALOG);
            }
        }
    }
}

/*
 * Sticky broadcasts persist and any prior broadcast will trigger in the 
 * broadcast receiver as soon as it is registered.
 * To clear any prior broadcast this code sends a blank broadcast to clear 
 * the last sticky broadcast.
 * This broadcast has no extras it will be ignored in the broadcast receiver 
 * setup in onPrepareDialog()
 */
private void clearPriorBroadcast(){
    Intent broadcastIntent = new Intent();
    broadcastIntent.setAction(MyService.BG_PROCESS_INTENT);
    sendStickyBroadcast(broadcastIntent);
}}

IntentService Class:

public class MyService extends IntentService {

public static final String BG_PROCESS_INTENT = "com.mindspiker.Tester.MyService.TEST";
public static final String KEY_COUNTER = "counter";
public static final int MAX_COUNTER = 100;

public MyService() {
  super("");
}

@Override
protected void onHandleIntent(Intent intent) {
    for (int i = 0; i <= MAX_COUNTER; i++) {
        Log.e("Service Example", " " + i);
        try {
            Thread.sleep(100);
        } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

        Intent broadcastIntent = new Intent();
        broadcastIntent.setAction(BG_PROCESS_INTENT);
        broadcastIntent.putExtra(KEY_COUNTER, i);
        sendStickyBroadcast(broadcastIntent);
    }
}}

Manifest file entries:

before application section:

uses-permission android:name="com.mindspiker.Tester.MyService.TEST"
uses-permission android:name="android.permission.BROADCAST_STICKY"

inside application section

service android:name=".MyService"